New Years Eve
by TheLiineGirl
Summary: Chris x Billie AU. "It was the 31st of December. As long as Chris could remember his mother had held New Years Eve parties for the closest family and friends. And this year was not an exception."


"Chris? Are you going to help me with this?" Piper said in an irritated tone. It wasn't a question, it was a statement that he should help her – because he wasn't.

Chris lazily got up from the couch. "You do know that I don't think this is a good idea, right?" he said, as he helped his mother moving chairs around the table.

"I don't care what you think Chris. This is tradition. Just because you think you're too old for this, doesn't mean the rest of us think it's stupid and childish." Piper said.

"Mom. I'm twenty-two. Will you please stop talking to me like I'm a dissatisfied sixteen year old?" Chris said. His mother only gave him a look, which told him that his mother thought he still acted like one. And maybe she was right. Maybe if he moved out of the house – like Wyatt had. But on the other hand, Wyatt spent most his time in the Manor anyway.

It was the 31st of December. As long as Chris could remember his mother had held New Years Eve parties for the closest family and friends. And this year was not an exception.

**xxx**

_(17 years ago)_

"_Wyatt and Chris stop it!" Piper shouted. The two boys looked at her._

"_But mom. We're in the middle of a fight." Wyatt said. Chris nodded. Their mother didn't seem to understand the importance of this fight. _

"_Listen, the guests come in three hours and everything – including you two – has to be ready by then. Got it?" Their mother said. _

"_Isn't it just Aunt Phoebe and Aunt Paige?" Wyatt asked, when Chris sad down in the chair._

"_And their families Wyatt. And a few other families." Piper said. She started doing the flowers. Chris didn't even want to know how many flowers there were._

"_What other families?" Wyatt asked._

"_The Jenkins and…" Piper said. _

"_Who's the Jenkins?" Wyatt asked. _

"_You remember Christy and Billie?" Piper asked. Wyatt nodded. Chris didn't remember Billie and Christy._

_Piper started telling who else was coming to the party, but Chris didn't listen, so he decided to go and do something else – like playing with the toy he got for Christmas._

**xxx**

Chris wondered why he was going to the party. His mother never told him that he had to, but it was a tradition in the family, not doing it would be weird.

When Chris was a kid the party was rather small – they were families, mother, father and children. But now all the former children had extra guests with – often boyfriends or girlfriends – some of them was even married and had children. It was like a never ending circle.

The doorbell rang five minutes to seven. The first guests had arrived. Piper was probably in a hurry and had let either Leo or Wyatt – who had arrived around five – open the door.

Melinda slammed the door up and entered the room with marching steps. "You want to leave too?" she asked. She – as a nineteen year old girl – thought she was meant to be somewhere else.

"Are you going to leave?" Chris asked her, as he watched her determined face and crossed arms. She did this often when she was unsatisfied with anything.

Melinda bit her lip and the firm attitude started fading. "I don't know. It seems a little weird doesn't it? No one ever leaves to celebrate New Year's Eve somewhere else." She wasn't going to leave - thankfully.

"Mom would probably get happy if we left. We always screw something up." Chris smirked. That wasn't just at New Year's Eve, though, the two of them had a reputation of always screwing up, and Wyatt was the savior every time.

"You don't say? Remember when we made the melons explode?" Melinda smiled. Chris did remember. Even though Chris at that time were twenty his mother grounded him – and Melinda – for two weeks. What had made the melons explode was still a mystery for them, but they exploded on the table in the middle of the dinner and all of the guests were covered in melon – all but Chris and Melinda, who were laughing behind the wall. It was never their intention to ruin anything, but somehow things always did.

"It was hilarious." Chris noted, while remembering all the faces covered in melon. "Not sure mom thinks that though."

Melinda laughed. "I wouldn't count on it. She still looks like she wants to kill us, when people bring it up." Chris was about to say that Piper always looked like she wanted to kill them, but was interrupted before he got to do it.

"Chris and Melinda?!" Piper shouted. "Will you please come down here and say hello to your guests."

"Speaking of the sun." Melinda mumbled as they walked out of the door and down the stairwell side by side, with matching heavy and lifeless steps.

As expected – but not said – Phoebe and Paige were the first to arrive – with their families of course.

"Phoebe." Chris smiled. She was the first he gave a hug. His relationship with Phoebe had always been slightly better than his relationship with practically every other family member.

Chris and Melinda did a hugging round, before ending up beside Wyatt, ready to welcome the next guests. And the other guests came. The thing Chris hated most about these things was that they seemed so solemn – all the handshaking and hugging together with the: 'Nice to see you again' and 'thank you."

Wyatt was the type that loved it – Melinda also was; she just didn't admit it. Chris, he just pretended that he liked it, but he didn't. He really didn't.

**xxx**

_(17 years ago)_

"_Come on Chris." Wyatt said. "The guests are coming soon and mom wants us to welcome them."_

_Chris nodded. He knew what welcoming meant; hugging and lot's of 'aw Chris. You've grown.' _

_When Chris and Wyatt walked down the stairwell, the doorbell rang. They both knew who were coming, so they started running down the stairs – well knowing that if their mother saw them, they would be in trouble. _

"_Phoebe!" Chris shouted running fast over to his aunt, who opened her arms ready to give him a huge hug. _

_Phoebe was Chris's favorite aunt. Phoebe was always happy and ready to play with Chris – all the games he wanted to play. _

_Even though Chris couldn't see it, he knew that Paige was hugging Wyatt beside him and Phoebe. When Phoebe let go of him, he went into Paige arms. Also Coop and Henry got hugs. Then he and Wyatt were supposed to stand and welcome the rest of the guest, but they couldn't stand still, so Leo sent them into the living room._

_Almost fifty-five minutes later they were all called to the table and Chris thought that meant that the last guest finally had arrived. But the last hadn't arrived, Chris found out, when there were four free chairs around the table – two of them at the children end._

**xxx**

Chris said, "Hello," and "Nice to meet you," what felt like a thousand times. Finally his mother called them to the tables.

When everyone was seated, Piper rose. Chris wished he had chosen to leave, normally Piper welcome-speech long and rather boring.

It turned out this year was different after all; "I just want to say welcome and thank you so much for coming. And because that the speech would be like the years I think you all remember it." – The older people let out a little laugh because this was 'funny' – "Even though we miss one, we will start the dinner."

Chris hadn't noticed the empty chair, before his mother pointed it out. The empty chair was beside Melinda, which told Chris that the missing person was a girl.

But who was it? He couldn't see anyone missing.

**xxx**

_(17 years ago)_

_Never in his life had Chris heard such a boring speech. The adults seemed to find it funny and good and all that, but Chris, he used most of the time trying to not falling asleep, which was a really hard thing, when you were five years old, were supposed to sit still and listen to something boring, but he tried, for his mother. _

"_The Jenkins is a little late, but we will start anyway." Piper finally ended. _

_Piper practically hadn't ended her speech before the door was opened. "I'm so sorry Piper." A woman called, she hurried trough the house and was fast with her hostess. "The traffic was awful, I tell you, awful!" Piper told the woman that it was okay, and she knew how awful the traffic could be. _

_Behind the woman came three other people. A man and two girls. One of the girls was standing in front of the man smiling and seemed like she wanted to talk to everybody in the room. The other girl was hiding behind the father and looked like she didn't want to talk to anyone. _

"_Billie and Christy are going to sit down there." Piper pointed at the two free chairs at the children's end. _

_The two sisters didn't seem much alike. The one who stood in front of their father was clearly the oldest. She took her littler sisters hand and guided her to the chair. Making sure she was sitting good, before sitting down beside her._

_Both sisters were blond, but the older sister's hair was darker than her little sister. The older sister's eyes were dark green – maybe a bit hazel – and her sister had light green eyes. Of course the oldest was the biggest. _

_The oldest sister – who's name were Christy – easily got to talk with the whole table. She was open and smiling. But Chris liked the youngest sister, Billie, the most._

_Christy told that Billie was five years old – just like Chris. Her blond hair went over her ears; she had a single plait in it. Her green eyes were soft and shy. She didn't say much, but Chris watched her carefully. He thought she was beautiful._

**xxx**

First course came in. It was a lot of fish. Piper liked to serve fish as first course. Chris didn't love fish, but his mother didn't really care about that.

When the fish came round for the second time, the front door opened. Piper rose and went to welcome the last guest.

Chris had been right; it was a girl who was missing. A tall, blond beautiful girl – or woman – with light green eyes. Chris knew the girl, but didn't know from where.

"Your seat is beside Melinda, Billie." Piper said. Billie? Who is Billie? Chris looked at Wyatt, he hoped to see Wyatt as confused as himself – or maybe see that Wyatt wasn't confused at all, so that he knew who this girl was. But Wyatt wasn't looking at Chris.

Chris couldn't help it, but to smirk. The look on Wyatt's face was not hard to read; he thought this Billie was good-looking. Chris tried to get eye-contact with Melinda, since he knew she would see the same thing, but Melinda was talking with Billie.

Chris was the type of person, who didn't like not knowing. He didn't like that he didn't know who this Billie was. So he spent the rest of the dinner trying to figure out, who this girl was.

**xxx**

_(17 years ago)_

_When the dinner was finished the children were told to leave the table and go to the rooms, so they did. _

_Wyatt thought it was a good idea to show the other kids around. Chris didn't like that, he had more important things to do, so he went to his room. _

_Chris didn't know how much time passed before Wyatt's showing ended up in his room, but he hated it. Until he saw that Billie was walking around while holding her sister's hand._

_When her eyes met his, he smiled to her. And she smiled back._

**xxx**

Piper let the children run out - everybody knew what rooms they were allowed in and which they weren't. Chris was of course not a child and therefore wasn't expected to leave the table and if you asked his mother he wasn't allowed to.

So there he sat. Wyatt was in a deep conversation with the woman sitting next to him and Melinda had been talking with Billie the entire evening. And since Chris wasn't the type of person that started talking to people he didn't know, he had no one to talk to.

"Can you at least try to look like you want to be here?" Piper's unsatisfied voice whispered in his ear, on one of her trips around the table to make sure everything was going right.

"You've always told me not to lie, dear mother." He answered, and at any other day Piper might have given him a smile for that response, but today the only thing he got was the dish-duty and a glance that could've killed him on a weak day.

Piper continued her walk around the table and whispered something to Melinda, which made his sister shake her head and with wearied movements pushed her chair back, while turning her head towards him: "Can you keep Billie with company while I help mom?" She rose and moved towards the kitchen before she turned around: "Without making her want to run away?"

Chris grinned: "Now, let's not set unrealistic goals, beloved sister." Melinda laughed back before she turned and lightly ran towards the kitchen to help her mother.

Chris then turned to Billie, and when their eyes met he smiled to her, and she smiled back.

**xxx**

_(17 years ago)_

_It was around eleven and most of the children were sleeping around in the living room; on couches, in chairs and on the carpets. Wyatt was running around with Christy playing hide-and-seek, or something, while Chris sat on an empty space on a couch. He was bored and stared into the air only waiting for it to be midnight._

_He felt a touch on his thigh. Billie, who was sleeping right next to him on the couch, had once again moved her foot. Chris smiled. He would normally hate such a thing but he liked Billie so much that it didn't matter._

_She suddenly blinked her eyes and slowly opened them. Chris turned his head so she shouldn't see that he had been looking at her. She worked herself up in a sitting position, but her foot still touched Chris. She rubbed her eyes and looked around to see her foot near his thigh. She looked at him and dragged her foot away._

_"I'm sorry," she whispered without looking at him._

_"It's okay. It kept me awake," he answered whispering. She smiled gratefully to him. "I'm Chris," he said and stuck his hand forward to her. _

_She took it and shook it: "My name is Billie." A silence fell over them, but a nice silence, a very comfortable one, which was only interrupted by the adults talking the room next door._

_After what felt like ages but in reality must only have been a matter of minutes, Chris gathered himself and turned to Billie: "Do you want to see the garden? Before all the grown-ups comes out there and ruins it?" He asked and felt rather confident in the moment. Billie nodded, so Chris rose once again stuck out his hand to her and, once she got up, showed the way outside._

_"I like it out here." Billie said, when they had sat down on a bench, and while they were looking up at the stars. Chris nodded. So did he._

**xxx**

"Didn't I tell you to keep her with company?" Melinda smirked as she sat down beside Billie again. Chris and Billie had not said a single word to each other since she left, which had been almost half an hour.

"Well I haven't left, have I?" Chris responded. Melinda rolled her eyes and was about to say something when he continued: "And you did tell me that you wanted her to stay, so I figured it was smartest not to say anything." Melinda laughed.

Billie looked at Chris with an asking look: "You can't be _that_ bad, can you?" She asked.

Before he got to answer Melinda did: "Not once you get to know him." As they laughed, Billie looked at Chris who shrugged to tell that it was the truth. After that they sat some time in silence that comfortable silence which Chris experienced with so few people.

"I don't think Piper will kill us for leaving now, do you want to go to the garden?" Chris asked, since silence was fine but he liked to have things going on.

As both girls agreed they all rose and went into the living room to get to the garden. They chatted about the changes of getting killed by Piper. Melinda stopped as she had realized something: "I promised to help her in the kitchen in... Now actually. She's going to kill me." She said, before turning and practically sprinted into the kitchen.

Chris turned and met Billie's eye, and he felt the awkward feeling creeping in. This was the reason he didn't talk to people he didn't know. He tripped and didn't know what to do.

"We can go back to the table if you want?" Billie said. If Chris had seen this and it was Wyatt he would have kicked him and told him not be such a loser, it wasn't like there was anything going between them. Two (almost-)adults could go out to the garden without any awkward tension.

"No, let's go into the garden. I'm getting sick of all the people in there." He answered and she smiled at him, while they went to the garden.

They sat down at the bench and turned their faces towards the cloudless sky. "It's beautiful." Billie said with a soft voice. Chris nodded. Billie looked at him and smiled: "Are you always so quiet?" She asked.

Chris turned his head and returned her look. He smiled and shook his head: "Never."

**xxx**

_(17 years ago)_

_"Look at them. They are adorable." Chris opened his eyes when he heard the voices. He sat on the bench with his legs under him and a blanket over him. He could feel something heavy on his shoulder and when he looked, only moving the eyes because he didn't want to move too much, he saw light hair and he knew that Billie was sleeping on his shoulder._

_Billie had also woken up, but she didn't move either. So when the grown-ups came out and started talking loud. The time was got nearer to midnight and they were ready to celebrate that._

_Chris and Billie didn't move, so just before midnight they sat there on the bench with a blanket over them and when the new year started Billie lightly kissed his cheek._

_This night was probably the best night in Chris' life._

**xxx**

She laughed as he told about the melons that exploded, and he had never liked telling the story more. Who had actually thought that he would like sitting out here with a more or less stranger?

Billie checked her watch: "It's soon midnight."

Chris nodded: "I know. Do you want to go into the others? We used to go out, but it ended up being too much, so they are inside."

Billie nodded. "I see. If it's okay with you, I'll rather stay here." Chris nodded, he would probably sit out here by himself anyway. "You know, I thought it would be a good idea to go to this party. My mother should have been there with me, but she got ill, and all I can think about being around them is her." She looked down at her hands. "I'm sorry, I shouldn't let it all out."

Chris wasn't good at comforting. At all. "It's okay. I think I can handle it." She looked at him and smiled gratefully.

Suddenly Melinda jumped out of the door. She seemed tipsy and had probably not been working in the kitchen all this time: "Are you coming?" She shouted. "It's soon midnight!" Chris and Billie exchanged looks, but rose together and grinned at Melinda's shout with joy. She ran back into the house before they reached her.

The moon was shining bright and made Billie's hair glow and made her look even more beautiful. He had dropped behind and when she turned at smiled to him, he thought if maybe she was some sort of New Year's miracle. "Should we go in? It's in seconds." She said and pointed with thumb over her shoulder. Chris nodded and she turned to go into the room.

Chris reached out, took her hand and pulled her back. She smiled at him only waiting for him to do something. As he heard the people in the house shout "Happy New Year", he pulled her even closer and kissed her.

Once they broke apart they started laughing, and they laughed as they went into the house hand in hand.

Who would have thought this might be one of the best nights of Chris' life?

**xxx**

_(17 years ago)_

_The Jenkins were some of last to leave when the party was over. Partly because of Christy and Wyatt who were having such a time together and partly because Mrs. Jenkins really wanted to help Piper - now that she arrived late. None of the reasons were because of Chris and Billie, who once again were sleeping, this time on a couch in the living room._

_When the Jenkins were ready to leave, Billie waved at Chris and went out to her parents. Chris didn't leave the couch until moments before they went out of the door. Chris had thought about what a great night he had had and he then realized that he should say properly goodbye to Billie. So he sprinted as fast as he could into the corridor._

_Billie was standing alone in the back because her parents had trouble getting Christy ready. Chris tiptoed past them all to get to her. He stuck out his hand to her: "Goodbye Billie. And thank you for a good evening," he said._

_She took his hand with a smile: "Goodbye Chris. The same to you!" Neither of them let go of the others hand._

_"Will you come back next year?" He asked without removing his eyes._

_"You mean this year?" She laughed. He grinned at her and nodded. "I hope so."_

_When the family went out of the door and the Halliwells were waving at them, Chris yelled to Billie: "I'll see you soon."_

**xxx**

When Chris woke up in the new year, he remembered where he had met Billie before. How weird it was that she had been the girl he had spent New Year's Eve with 17 years ago. He remember being sad when his mother told him that the Jenkins didn't come to the New Year's party anymore. He had actually thought that he was going to see her again. Soon anyway.

He had sometimes looked back at that night, without knowing who the girl was anyway, and thought that he should have made her stay. Maybe not really stay, but made sure that she was going to come back. For at moment he thought he had made the same mistake again.

It was stupid though, because he could feel her hair on his arms and her foot on his leg. She smiled at him when she woke up.

And Chris had never been happier.


End file.
